Michael Shaara (1928–1988)

A very satisfying and engaging page-turner.

This novel has great characters and descriptions of the battle without getting too bogged down for non-military readers. I found myself wanting a bit more detail on the tactics and strategy, as well as the basic events of the battle that were taking place away from the main characters, but the characters and engagements that received focus were extremely well presented.

I enjoyed the literary device of each chapter being in the voice and inner thoughts of a different character, which provided more insight than was possible in the movie Gettysburg. For example, in the movie Chamberlain is talking to Kilrain and brings up the quote from Hamlet, "how like an angel" and Kilrain retorts "killer angel". In the book, it was a memory of his days as a student studying Shakespeare and he had written a speech about this quote and shared it with his father, who retorted "murderous angel" and he had then revised his speech around that idea and gave the speech with great success, and his father was very proud of him. Later he feels this same sense of pride after his actions on Little Round Top on Day 2.

The novel also does so much than the movie can to show the inner anguish of Longstreet.

There are other notable differences with the film, which makes it seem like Reynolds and the 1st Corps were already well on their way on June 30th to support Buford, when the book makes it clear no one is coming until Buford sends urgent messages, and another officer besides Reynolds might have not hurried so quickly which would have led to an entirely different outcome of the battle.

A very satisfying read.… (more)